The Trip Here

I was so pleased to meet up with old family friends in Dallas, and also Jek and Louise!

 Dawn through the frosted window

 Heathrow Airport views of London

 Beautiful, isn't it?

 Okay, yes, they are just photographs.

 So no, that's not me taking pictures.

What happened is that I got very little sleep on the flight over to London, and no one in the airport seemed to know info on tours of the city. So between my tiredness and lack of info, I declined to leave the airport. Even though I got a free extended stay there. :-) I was given incorrect information about my flight, and missed it. But when I finally arrived at the proper gate in the proper terminal, the kind ticket agent didn't make me pay again, an   unexpected blessing! She even told me which terminal would allow me to spend the night there. Even then, at 11:00 or 11:300, someone came through waking everybody (maybe 25 or 30), and herding us into a lounge. Because I obeyed quickly, I was among the ones who scored a lounge chair for the night--nice! So we all got to sleep until 3:45 when they woke us to evacuate the room for club members or whatever.

Heathrow doesn't decide gates until two hours before flight departure, nor do they list terminals on boarding passes; at least mine didn't. So since a family friend, Ryan, was to arrive early in the morning, also heading to visit the family, I parked myself near Security to scan incoming teens traveling by themselves. No luck, so I finally found somewhere to pile up my carry-ons and snooze. It was cold in the area, so on top of my long-sleeved shirt and jacket, I draped a scarf over me, then pulled off my sandals and put on some socks. Not the height of fashion, but I was going to be sleeping, so who cared?

After several naps during the day, and snacks, mostly from home, but also a duck sandwich (not destined to become a favorite of mine), I wandered to a different area, having already checked out all the nearby stores, which were expensive. This was warmer, thankfully, more conducive to sleeping. Eventually I woke up and looked around, thinking I should check for Ryan again. Several yards away to my left was a young man who seemed a good candidate: no skinny jeans or effeminate clothing. After a while he pulled out a Bible, and I thought to myself, 'Bingo, here's the man!' I walked over and spoke to him (he wasn't expecting to see me there),

 and sure enough, he was Ryan. Still is actually. 

We chatted until it was time to relocate to our gate for the Cape Town flight.

So things worked out fine, thank the Lord.